


you won't even know I was here

by RedMushroom



Series: Screw prompts, give me points! [2]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: Coda to 10x23, I'm not sure about this, Post-Season/Series 10 Finale, kinda destiel
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-13
Updated: 2015-06-13
Packaged: 2018-04-04 02:15:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,175
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4122274
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RedMushroom/pseuds/RedMushroom
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>And even in between of all of this, Castiel took a step back from him. Once upon a time, they never shared uncomfortable silences. Dean was never afraid of losing him (until he lost him for good).</p><p>(prompt 41)</p>
            </blockquote>





	you won't even know I was here

**Author's Note:**

> [Written for the "Screw Challenge" with the prompt n°41]
> 
> Hi! Despite the fact that this fiction is written in english, I'm not a native speaker.  
> I did my best to spot all the mistakes, but surely you'll find some in the text. I'm so sorry for it. It's unbetaed.  
> Also, it is my fist attempt with this _writing in english_ thing, so I'm double sorry for the contents of the work. 
> 
> Anyway, thanks for reading ♥

  * 41\. Even if I talk in whispers, you won't even know I was here




 

They go back to the bunker. There's nothing left to do.

Dean is not surprised when they find Castiel at their door, covered in blood. He spends just a word (“Hello”) to them, before they allow him to stay.

After that, Castiel doesn't do much. He sits on their couch for an entire day, while Sam tries to find something about the Darkness in their library.

Like the men of letters could solve this. Like they could actually fix the world again.

Fixing it from  _what_ ? Dean doesn't even know what they broke this time, what they let free. He thinks about asking Castiel to let Sam talk to him since they have been part of the same book club lately.

But no.

They don't ask. Castiel says nothing. Castiel just stays out of the way – it is his favourite hobby since the angels fell. Staying apart. Out of Dean's life, breathing on a parallel line except when he is plotting with Sam.

( _You can't stay_ )

Dean was the one who made him go. And again, he didn't have time to think about Castiel during the past year, because when he was not trying to murder people, he was actually worrying about hunting _things_. 

Besides, he doesn't want to face Cas. He's a coward like that.

Every time they meet, Dean has the feeling that Cas could see what he was becoming better than anyone else. Better than his brother. Because Sam is so convinced that _that_ Dean – the Dean who killed an innocent boy just a couple of days before – isn't his brother.

Dean wasn't  _ possessed _ by a demon. The mark wasn't overwhelming him. Dean had just gave up, like he did when he wanted to say  _yes_ to Michael. And Castiel  _knows_ that. Maybe he can also physically sense it, like when he was capable of seeing Meg's true form back in the days.

So Castiel doesn't talk, Dean refuses to make eye contact with him.

( _Next time, I won't miss_ )

It is fine. Silence is the best thing he can hope for after what happened. Although, in the dark of his room, when he closes his eyes hoping he won't dream, that silence seems to weigh down his chest.

Sometimes, if he listens very, very carefully , he can hear footsteps out of his door, and he  wonders if it's Sam, unable to sleep, or Cas wandering in the bunker.

Likely, it's just his freaking mind filling the dark with  _something_ not to be afraid of.

Other times, the silence grows in the light of day. Sam sitting in the kitchen, while Castiel helps him with the translation of an old book.

Having nothing better to do, Dean decides to start reading those files they dug up from the land of last hope-boxes full of research papers. He ends up in the library.

Sam cleaned it up well. The books have been put back in the shelves, the bodies carried out and burned. He helped with that. Took them out one after another. The kid's too.

He isn't the first one Dean killed. And he wasn't Kevin nor Charlie, a loved one who died. But Dean wants to puke when he thinks about him. About what he has done.

The old him – the Dean who wanted to  _save people_ , because that was his father's legacy – would never have done it. That kid was just another way to give up on himself.

Maybe stop fighting, turning into that version of himself that he used to find in the mirror, is his way of allowing himself to leave his brother. To say goodbye.

You're better without me, Sammy.

Out of the blue, Castiel is there. It takes Dean a little to take note of him, because Castiel is just standing, watching him with his hands in the pockets of his trenchcoat, resembling the angel who helped them with the apocalypse.

_You should say something_ , he means to say, because it feels like he has to.  _You should stop watching me like this._ He would take a pause then. The second part would be harder. Y _ou should stop watching me like you have_ faith. 

Dean purses his lips. His eyes fall from the line of Castiel's shoulders to the files he was reading. By now, he's sure that neither of them has nothing to add to their non-conversation.

Then, there is the fear. The longing he's holding on to, the unspoken that Cas can hear if he wants to.

Dean can hear nothing. Not even Cas' whispers. Like he has to grasp and tighten his fist into Castiel not to let him slip away.

“Did you guys find anything?”

“Sam told me” Castiel begins, not answering. “The darkness caught you both. You were into it.”

Dean freezes.

“How was it like?”

 _Thank you, Sam._ Now he has to talk. How great. And then they can have a tea party and discuss which colour suits best for a vampire hunt..

The fact is that as he asks, no invisible barrier comes to keep Castiel out. It never works like that. Castiel comes (and goes away and comes back) and every time Dean says shitty things to him. Heavy shit. Yelled shit.

Castiel is the only one Dean can yell at without fear of being left. Without feeling not enough.

“You're here since the world’s birth” Dean shrugs, because seriously, Cas should know about this craziness more than them. “You _must_ know about it.”

Castiel sucks in a breath. There is in him that kind of something that makes people jerk for the ring of a bell. The kind that you feel when you sleep with a gun under your pillow and the Devil himself is out there looking for you (or your brother).

Finally, Castiel says “I'm clueless” and it costs him a big effort to put those words together. Castiel isn't okay with the not-knowing thing.

Just imagine living for thousands of years, big as the biggest star in the sky, ancient and burning at the centre of the universe, equipped with all the knowledge of the world, and then you're trapped with the only thing you don't know.

The second thing you don't know. The mark was quite a pain in the ass too.

“It was a story. A legend.” Dean didn't see that coming from Cas. “Our brothers used to tell us before The Fall. Nothing more. They never talked about the mark.”

Turns out the story is not only a story, right?

Dean pauses. He can feel the blood pumping in his ears, his arm itching where the mark was.

“It was cold.” slowly, Dean glances up to the trench coat “Not like hell. Hell was pain and sorrow and desperation.”

Castiel listens quietly, still distant from him, stuck at the other side of the room. He's staring, assimilating. Dean's lips part again “Hell was something. Absence. The Darkness was like a hole. A void. Nothing can fill it, you can just drown in it. It was – ”

_Just like the mark, but worse_ . 

Dean struggles to find the words to describe it. Absence is easy to acknowledge, it's a reminder of what there once was in your life.

The void doesn't denote anything. It's just dark. And the more you watch it, the more it gets bigger and darker. It makes you angry. Empty.

Castiel stares down at him, eyes moving on Dean's face, and Dean feels it like a physical touch. Last time Castiel looked at him like this, Dean didn't have the mark. Somehow, it makes his stomach clutch.

So he really looks different without it.

Dean shrugs, ignoring the strain on the back of his head. “That's all.” he finishes, because yes, what they have in their hands is that the darkness is freaking terrifying and they have no ways to kill it..

For a moment, Dean thinks Castiel is gone, disappeared in a blink. “You think you did the wrong thing.”

It's not a question. Hell, it's never a question. Not with Cas, not since they met.

“I killed Death. I released a freaking force that no one can defeat.” Dean's jaw clenches “Don't fucking tell me I didn't mess up.”

“I'm not.”

It's spontaneous to look up to Cas now.

“Because it wasn't just you”

Dean swallows.  _It was just me when I almost killed you_ . 

Indeed it's true. He made a choice. They both did, and choosing leads to consequences. Dean is not a fool, he's a grown ass man and he doesn't want pity. Which Castiel isn't going to show him.

Look who's talking _now_.

Dean doesn't know why Castiel is there. To help, he supposes. Team free will against the suicide instincts of the world – of the Winchesters.

Usually Castiel doesn't help from where they're staying. He jumps from one place to another, using the wings he doesn't have anymore, calling from time to time if he has some news. In the past, he has been between heaven and earth, appearing from nowhere to bring good news such as _Lucifer is back in town_.

The truth is, that version of Castiel doesn't exist anymore. He has been an angel first and a friend later; he has been the god who died in a lake and the angel he lost in purgatory. He has been that homeless guy who didn't know how to date, who died (again, Dean hates counting all the times he watched Castiel die in front of his eyes) and who couldn't have a place in the bunker.

He has been a broken angel without his grace and now – what he is now is up to Cas.

And even in between of all of this, Castiel took a step back from him. Once upon a time, they never shared uncomfortable silences. Dean was never afraid of losing him (until he lost him for good).

“Why didn't you tell me about the book?”

Pause.

“Sam said it was the right thing to do.”

Dean closes his fist, eyes back on the book. “Since when you're back to following orders?”

His words are like venom and betrayal to his ears. Dean doesn't want them to come out like that.

“Since I didn't know what to do.” Castiel's voice is soft in contrast to Dean's “I wasn't following orders, I was trying to help a friend.”

Oh, Dean can be so unfair. Keeping his mouth shut would be so convenient, but Dean isn't famous for being considerate.

“I don't know how to talk to you anymore.”

That's it. That's how Dean lost.

Castiel's admission sends something Dean can't name deep in his guts. Talking to Cas had been natural since the beginning.

“I messed up, Dean.” there's nothing in his voice as Castiel goes on. Like that time in a motel room, when he said _I'm afraid I might kill myself,_ as if it was nothing “I messed up _again_. I cast the angels out. I broke heaven _again_.”

Guilt was clear in his eyes.

Yeah. Cas's so good in messing things up when he tries to help. That's why he makes a good Winchester.

Bobby would be proud of him. At least he would be, once he kicked his ass and made him clean his mess.

But it doesn't matter.

Castiel still doesn't know who he is. Not anymore. Guess what? Dean can relate.

“I couldn't come back after that.”

“Cas.” Dean tries, he doesn't want to go on that topic.

“And then you became a demon and it felt like I failed you.”

Fail him. Funny. This time Dean was the one playing barbies with a demon. This time Dean is the one who owes him a speech, even if Castiel didn't explain himself when he turned against him. When he ran away with the tablet.

Dean was glad of it.

Now Castiel is explaining himself, and Dean doesn't know what to do. Fuck, he can't even face him because Dean is more capable of actions than words.

“You never failed me.” Dean blurts out, and it is a bit of a lie. He did, multiple times, when Dean thought that Castiel was a perfect constant who couldn't fail.

Something shifts after that. There are a million ways to finish that conversation. Dean can't pick a single one. He wants to say, _Thank you_. Because Castiel tried to talk to him when Dean was too deaf to hear. He wants to say, _sorry_. But that is the most difficult part. He can't come out with a _I'm sorry if I tried to stab you_ card.

“You always come back.”

That's it. Dean regrets saying it as soon as he opens his mouth. _Stupid_.

He clears his throat “I should ask Sam about those files” Dean starts, eyes darting from Cas to the files to the almost-smile that cracks on Castiel's face. “I should - _yeah_ ”

Castiel nods. “I'll call him for you.”

“We can finish _later_.”

Dean  hesitates .

“Of course”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


End file.
